"Now, concentrate and visualize your hands glowing. Try to feel the energy of the iron.", her father instructed.

She did as she was told and she felt something warm up in her hands. Her eyes darted open and she saw her hands starting to glow a faint yellow.

"Can you see it?", her father asked eagerly. Jian Li nodded and smiled at him, her cheeks slightly pink.

Her father smiled and nodded his head in response.

"You're catching on very quickly."

She closed her eyes and concentrated hard again. The iron began to cool in her hands as it started to glow brighter and brighter.

Soon, the room became illuminated by the piece of iron in her hands. The air grew warmer and warmer as she felt her father pull it out of her hands. There were a few faint but curved lines etched on top of the blade.

"Watch," he said.

He held the glowing iron and as his whole body started to glow, the raw iron that had been refined into an ingot by Jian Li, began to be remade as a sword as the veins of metal grew and formed, giving shape to a great longsword that was glowing brightly. She gasped in amazement as the glow began to fade and the blade stopped giving off any light.

"This is our family's Cultivation Art of Refinement. It allows us to refine raw material into whatever we want. Our ancestors used it to create the foundations of this village. Our family now uses it to forge weapons to defend our home. And since you have shown great promise in our Art, you will learn to use it as well."

As she took the newly forged blade, her father smiled at her. "You are only 7 years old now, but you can handle the energy I put into the iron. Your Spirit is not bad at all, it's even comparable to mine when I was your age.", her father said calmly trying to downplay her achievements. In reality, her father was in shock and felt like he had witnessed the birth of a monster.

"Her level of control is unheard of for someone in our family to have at her age and this is even before she has started to cultivate. The only thing that's lacking is her inner energy, but that's the easiest problem to fix. I wonder what Jian Wen is going to feel about this.", her father thought to himself.

The glow of the sword mesmerized Jian Li and she could not look away from it. Its aura resonated and radiated throughout her body. She snapped out of it when she heard her father's voice again.

"Jian Wen. You will train and assist your sister with our Refinement Art."

"Yes, Father."

Suddenly, the sword started to glow a faint blue and the sword began to transform. It turned into a stream of fireflies that flew to the side where the pale and skinny Jian Wen was standing with his grey robes, seemingly merging into the background in silence.

Her eldest brother Jian Wen was the most reclusive among her siblings and had never paid much attention to her or the others. The only things he seemed to care about were forging and weapons, just like their father.

"Chen never showed promise in our Art, but you, you show a tremendous amount of talent in it. I and Father will train you in the Art of Refinement. You will learn to control the inner energy of your body and make it obey your commands through our family's Cultivation Art. You will also learn weapon-based martial arts alongside your brother and the others to protect yourself."

"Yes, Brother.", Jian Li responded.

Only after that exchange did Jian Li realize that the assistants and regular weaponsmiths close by were all looking at her with awe and she felt slightly awkward for zoning out for all that time.

"Even weaponsmithing in this world can be so magical...", Jian Li thought.

She had never seen her father make any weapons in person and was never particularly interested and as a result, she always thought he was an ordinary blacksmith. Even Jian Chen never talked anything about the family Art and her elder sister Jian Ye always avoided the subject of cultivation.

But now, she was witnessing the power the family Art had in person.

As for Jian Wen, he disliked talking so Jian Li learned very quickly to not pursue any answers from him. She just knew that he was very close to their father and was good at forging weapons as well.

"Jian Li, are you okay?", her father asked. She jumped slightly when she heard his voice. He must have spoken to her.

"I'm sorry. Did you say something, Father?", she asked politely but her cheeks still turned red at having been caught daydreaming.

"Although it's still early for you to start cultivating the soul, we can teach you the basics behind it. Later on, you can go to a martial arts sect in Banmian with your big brother Jian Chen when you reach 10 years of age to learn how to defend yourself properly. Before you go, you will still get a lot of our family's martial arts manuals and train from them at home. They will help you prepare yourself for the actual training.", her father said.

"You should also be able to cultivate some inner energy by then as well.", her eldest brother added on.

"Why would I be sent to a martial arts sect far away?", Jian Li asked. She was excited because she did not go to school like the other village kids but was home tutored, and as such she really could do whatever she wanted.

The only downside was that she never got to organically interact with the other village kids and as a result, she only became shyer.

On the other hand, she was getting bored of lazing around and had not really seen the outside world. Her patience was wearing thin.

"There are a lot of people in the world and many factions, and our family is just a small one made up of weaponsmiths. It is important to learn how to defend yourself properly, you should never rely on just our Art. It is also a good idea to learn about other types of martial arts to broaden your horizons and be able to incorporate other Arts into our family's Art your own way.", her father preached.

Most of the other workers viewing the scene were nodding their heads supportively while others were getting tired of watching and went back to work.

Abruptly, Jian Li felt as if her eyes and limbs were getting heavier. As the ground grew closer to her face, a skinny but reliable arm grabbed her and picked her up.

Slowly as she felt her consciousness fade away, she could partially make out her father calmly saying: "She overused her energy, let her rest."